[TV/Book Spoilers] What´s the deal with the Freys?

[SerMixalot]

In the books he held the honour of one noble girl in higher regard than the outcome of the entire war and the fates of thousands of his own men. Is that really much more admirable than what he did in the show?

yes because he believes, like his father that one must act honorably is ALL cases. This is a strict moral code, which apparently not many people understand in this day and age (which is somewhat disturbing in its own right). It is the conflict that arises from this strict moral code that causes irreconcilable conflcts throughouth ASOIAF.

It is about doing the right thing. Banging a noble woman and leaving her is simply not the right thing to do. that happened from a moment of physical weakness (injury) and massive grief (the loss of an unselfish love-his brothers).

THAT IS THE POINT. Not that this or that is understandable or loveis more important than the honor of a small house. It is about doing the right thing.

Pursuing Talisa was a selfish act. He pursued her for his own selfish reasons-love. that pointed is screamed to the viewer in episode 8.

[rmanoj]

You don't think moral imperatives have to be ranked when they come into conflict with each other? How does Robb's duty to Jeyne outweigh his duty to thousands of men who were dependant on him?

[SerMixalot]

I believe that Ned and Robb believed that one must always do the honorable thing, that ranking does not come into play. Thus Ned arguing that killing dany and her unborn child is dishonorable despite it saving thousands of other innocents.

[Maia]

Until he makes his tragic mistake of sleeping with Jeyne he acts perfectly, wins every battle, wins every diplomatic maneuver,

Huh? It is made very clear in the books that Robb didn't understand diplomacy and politics at all and that it massively contributed to his doom. His one diplomatic overture was disastrous and not only because of the people involved, but also because he took a completely wrong tone. Robb didn't understand that alliances are matters of quid pro quo even when both sides share a common goal, he didn't see how Kingdom of the North that includes poorly defensible Riverlands was an epically bad idea no matter who sat on the Iron Throne, he thought that he could achieve complete victory by military means alone, etc.

She does this all without any consideration for the consequences.

I do wish that GRRM had spelled it out in her PoV, but do remember that at that point Cat thought that there was a massive Lannister conspiracy that Tyrion was a part of, that had already resulted in the deaths of one Hand and 2 attempts on Bran. She was wrong, as it happens, but she did have as much circumstantial evidence for this view, as Ned had for the bastardy of the royal children. So, from her PoV, as soon as Tyrion recognized her, the game was up and it was all about who stole the first march on whom.

She has him swear by the sword but hey this is a member of the Kinsguard who put his sword in Aerys back.

She doesn't rely on Jaime's word, though, but Tyrion's. Tyrion made the official offer of exchange in open court, in his role as the acting Hand. By questioning Jaime, and comparing it with what Tyrion told her earlier, Cat had finally found out that Tyrion had nothing to do with the attempts on Bran, that he had been telling her the truth the whole time and thus may be somewhat trustworthy.

Lannisters may be dodgy, but they do observe the Westerosi norms about exchanges and such. As we later see, those exchanges don't happen with any particular precautions either, just with small delegations coming under the flag of truce and doing it. Which is why it was so damaging of Edmure to proclaim far and wide that it was not an exchange, that Jaime had escaped.

Further, Cat understood Cersei's character and knew what sacks entail well enough to forsee that the girls were unlikely to survive KL's fall to Stannis.

And _if_ Stannis had won, Jaime would have become fairly worthless as a hostage anyway. Whereas the girls were now Robb's only heirs and situation of a ruler without heirs is very precarious.

The funny thing is, that if Jaime hadn't been massively delayed by the Bloody Mummers and made it to KL before the Battle of the Blackwater, the Starks would have actually gotten Sansa back. We know this, because we see PoVs of both Tyrion and Jaime. So, Cat wasn't even wrong to believe that they might honor the exchange. Of course, they didn't have

Arya, but even having Sansa alone would have been helpful at that point.

Again, the whole mess happened, because Robb really was bad at politics. He went off out of reach of communications for months without leaving anybody with the authority to handle the potentially volatile political situation for him in his absence. And before that, he basically ignored all and any pleas for political decisions that Roderick and Luwin didn't have the authority to make on their own, as a result of which the North fell into disorder and internecine warfare.

Book Robb was a precocious, brilliant warlord, but he failed at everything else that being a ruler entails. That was his tragedy.

[SerMixalot]

You don't think moral imperatives have to be ranked when they come into conflict with each other? How does Robb's duty to Jeyne outweigh his duty to thousands of men who were dependant on him?

and again it was Robb's mistake that left him in the position he was in. No matter what he did he was going to act dishonorably, either to leave Jeyne as spoiled fruit or break his vow to the Freys. He THOUGHT he could make amends to the Freys, but the damage was already done

[Mulled Wino]

I believe that Ned and Robb believed that one must always do the honorable thing, that ranking does not come into play. Thus Ned arguing that killing dany and her unborn child is dishonorable despite it saving thousands of other innocents.

So the honorable thing was clearly to bang your nurse and break his betrothal. Just like Ned, wait never mind

HE ALREADy BROKE HIS FUCKING HONOR.

[Mulled Wino]

and again it was Robb's mistake that left him in the position he was in. No matter what he did he was going to act dishonorably, either to leave Jeyne as spoiled fruit or break his vow to the Freys. He THOUGHT he could make amends to the Freys, but the damage was already done

His father apparently thought there was a more important decision than marrying every woman you spoiled (from Robbs perspective)

[Clariana]

Nobody here has mentioned Roose Bolton who always seemed to be around when Talisa and Robb were getting together and sending dark looks in their direction... If your immediate feudal lord was about to rashly lose the loyalty of most of his bannermen and you happened to be somewhat ambitious, would you tell him not to go there? Or would you attempt to block others from telling him this?

[SerMixalot]

So the honorable thing was clearly to bang your nurse and break his betrothal. Just like Ned, wait never mind

HE ALREADy BROKE HIS FUCKING HONOR.

Yes of course he did. Noone is arguing otherwise. But what were the circumstances of his breach of honor

He was wounded-physically weak

He was grief stricken-emotionally weak (an emotional weakness over the loss of loved ones)

Thus he becomes a tragic hero by making a mistake. If he did not sleep with Jeyne he would be a perfect hero (and in literary terms not able to fall). But he made a mistake, a single mistake that leads to his downfall.

[Davos55]

My question is why were there literally no Freys on the show this season at all? We just got the mention of Walder at the end and that is about it. Are a bunch of Frey soldiers or a couple more important ones just going to show up next season or what?

[Davos55]

Nobody here has mentioned Roose Bolton who always seemed to be around when Talisa and Robb were getting together and sending dark looks in their direction... If your immediate feudal lord was about to rashly lose the loyalty of most of his bannermen and you happened to be somewhat ambitious, would you tell him not to go there? Or would you attempt to block others from telling him this?

I really wish Roose would have been in the finale. I feel that the marriage was just so rushed and honestly ridiculous, they should have just waited to do that next season, or actually have some sort of legitimate scene with repercussions. Even if they just showed Bolton watching the wedding from afar or something like that, it would have served a better purpose.

Honestly though, I can't wait for Robb to get killed in the RW..Can not wait..

[SelaBela]

Maybe Robb will take Talisa along with him to the Twins... that would be awesome. I must be a pretty awful human being.

[Mulled Wino]

Yes of course he did. Noone is arguing otherwise. But what were the circumstances of his breach of honor

He was wounded-physically weak

He was grief stricken-emotionally weak (an emotional weakness over the loss of loved ones)

Thus he becomes a tragic hero by making a mistake. If he did not sleep with Jeyne he would be a perfect hero (and in literary terms not able to fall). But he made a mistake, a single mistake that leads to his downfall.

He's still making a single tragic mistake here. I would definitely prefer if they kept to the book version of events here, or at least something reasonably close like her being robbs nurse and a full blown affair starts from there. I dont think the show ruined robb though.

And as far as Roose goes, he's going to let Rob bury himself just like in the books. He's already moving against the Starks, why would he stop the wedding?

[Former Lord of Winterfell]

The actual wedding probably took place a few days after they had sex. But we've seen flirting, romantic strolls, repeated visits to the royal tent for what must have been at least weeks if not months. And what I find so hard to beleive is that during all this time, noone, not the Blackfish, not the Greatjon, not Galbart Glover, not Maege Mormont, nor Catelyn or any lord fromt the North or the Riverlands told Robb that: ' if we loose the Freys, we will most likely loose the entire war '

Well, lords/kings banging women on campaign doesn't seem like all that unusual a thing. Especially if they're not married. Until he actually got married, it was sort of a "no harm/no foul" kind of thing. To steal a line from James Earl Jones, his bannermen may have thought Robb was just sowing his royal oats.

Anyway, it looks like the actaul banging and the wedding followed on each other pretty quickly, so the period of trul objectionable conduct seems pretty short.